In 2016, Netflix expects to launch 600 hours of original programming, up from 450 hours in 2015, content chief Ted Sarandos said at the start of the year. The company has projected content spending on a profit/loss basis to rise from $5 billion this year to more than $6 billion in 2017.

The original TV series and movies will continue to be a mix of content owned and produced by Netflix, as well as co-productions and acquisitions, Wells said. The company is “one-third to halfway” toward reaching the 50% originals target, he said. Not every show needs to be a breakout hit, he added: “We don’t necessarily have to have home runs… We can also live with singles, doubles and triples especially commensurate with their cost.”

Most of Netflix’s original movies are not huge-budget projects, Wells said, citing “Bright,” starring Will Smith and Joel Edgerton and directed by David Ayer, as an outlier. Netflix is reportedly spending some $90 million on the movie.

Hundreds of movies disappeared from Netflix over 2016, the result of the streaming service’s decision to end several key content deals with top studios and distributors.

It was a brave move - particularly given that its main rivals, such as Hulu, jumped at the chance to take on some of those titles Netflix decided it no longer wanted.

The reason for the cull? Original content.

On Wednesday we learned the company has been rewarded handsomely for putting its eggs in the original content basket. After hours trading on Wednesday saw the company’s stock rise by as much as 9% on the news it had added 7.05 million new subscribers in the last three months of 2016.

That’s far greater than the 5.2 million they had anticipated, and left them ending the year with 93.8 million subscribers in total - and an expectation of breaking the symbolic 100 million mark by the end of March.